Husband and Wife as Co-owners of Immovable Property

Abstract

Property relations between spouses have for many years been a domain which did not receive the proper and direct attention it deserved from the hands of the legislature.Ottoman and Mandatory Periods: Under the Ottoman regime these matters were dominated by personal or religious law, as the case happened to be, and there was no law in existence which was applicable to all the inhabitants of die territory known as Palestine, irrespective of people's religious beliefs or formal religious affiliations.The Mandatory authorities did not wish to interfere with the existing pattern. The Palestine Orders-in-Council 1922–1947, under arts. 51–67, accorded a special status to the religious courts of the various religious communities within the judiciary of Palestine. Not all religious courts enjoyed the same extent of jurisdiction but all exercised, in matters of personal status either exclusive jurisdiction over the members of their communities or concurrent jurisdiction together with the civil courts in those cases where all the parties to the action consented to such jurisdiction. “Personal status” as defined by art. 51 covered a wide range of matters some of them concerning the person as such and others concerning proprietary rights to which a person is entitled by reason of his personal status such as alimony, maintenance, succession.